ATLA Ponderings
by wherewulf
Summary: Stories from the worlds of Avatar: the Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra, and sometimes a mix of the two.
1. Avatar Tunes

Hello, folks, and thank you for joining on my new ATLA/LOK story thread, _ATLA Ponderings_. This thread will mainly be stories based on _Avatar: the Last Airbender_ with a few _Legend of Korra_ thrown in, and sometimes… a mix of the two, like this one. We'll see what happens.

_Avatar: the Last Airbender_ and _The Legend of Korra_, of course, are the property of Mike DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, and also by extension Nickelodeon, Viacom, Paramount, CBS, or whatever corporation owns them at the moment, and my deep thanks to Messrs. DiMartino and Konietzko for creating them. And with that, on with the show.

And I think you'll figure out which one(s). :D

* * *

_**Avatar Tunes**_

Korra woke up in a desert—which was strange because she was sure she was on Air Temple Island. She did remember Avatar Aang had been in a desert before, so maybe… this was a vision from his life? Hard to say.

She stood and looked around. The desert was strikingly beautiful. Deep canyons threw up towers of rock, and the colors were so vivid—the orange and tan of rock and sand, splashes of yellow where the sun shone on the desert floor, reds and purples where the canyon deepened into shadow, and the sky was an incredibly clear bright blue. It was a nice place. Very dry, but nice.

Movement caught Korra's eye. A figure cloaked in dust zipped along a road at the base of the canyon. Korra found that the road curved away from the rocks and toward her—no, she was actually standing in the middle of that road. If that figure followed the road, it would be on her in an instant.

Which it did. And it was.

Roaring out of the canyon, the figure barreled down on her at incredible speed. Eventually she reacted, realizing the need to Earthbend, Firebend, Airbend, get out of the way, _something_—

Then the figure shuddered to a stop, barely two paces away from her.

Since whatever it was hadn't done anything else to her or at her, she waited and allowed the dust cloud to dissipate. When it did, it revealed a bald-headed boy in an orange cape-like tunic and yellow-tan pants—with a very prominent sky-blue forward-pointing arrow on his forehead.

Korra's jaw dropped. "Avatar Aang? How—what are you—?"

The boy grinned, stuck out his tongue several times, and jumped up. "Meep meep!" Then _zing!_ off he zipped down the road in a flash.

Korra stood there slack-jawed for a moment. Then she saw that something else was coming out of the canyon, but at a much slower speed. This figure, when it came into view, was clad in black and red armor. He too was bald except for a warrior's ponytail on the back of his head. He ran up toward Korra, then slowed, obviously tiring. He came to a stop within speaking distance of Korra, hunched over and exhausted.

It took Korra a while to figure out who this was, and that too was a shock. "Prince _**Zuko?**_" she said as he stood there panting. "How—what are _you_ doing here?"

That earned her a glare. He straightened and held up a sign.

_What does it look like I'm doing?_ the sign read. He turned the sign around. _I'm trying to capture the Avatar!_

Korra tried to square that with the fact that _she_ was the Avatar—notwithstanding the fact that Aang had just run by. "Well, I, uh—"

Then Zuko's eyes bugged out as an anvil dropped on him and squished him into a hole in the desert floor. Alarmed, Korra looked up. Nope. No anvils.

"Okay," said another voice. Korra's attention was drawn to her left, where there stood a teenage Sokka. He rubbed his hands together. "Let's get down to business."

Korra was about to answer _that_ when a group of Kyoshi Warriors popped out from behind Sokka and chorused, "_To defeat—the Huns!_" They disappeared again behind Sokka, who stood there looking around and confused.

All of a sudden Korra was looking at a woodland scene with green trees, and Aang, bound chin to toe in rope, was standing before a triumphant Zuko. "Okay, you got me, Zuko," said Aang. "Would you like to flame me now, or wait til you get home?"

"Flame him now! Flame him now!" said freedom fighter Jet.

Korra frowned. _Where did_ he _come from?_

Aang turned to Jet. "You keep out of this! He doesn't have to flame you now!"

"Well, I say he _does_ have to flame me now!" He turned to Zuko, jumping up and down. "_**So flame me now!**_"

Zuko stood there confused—then shrugged and shot a huge torrent of fire at Jet, leaving him blackened and bug-eyed.

Now Korra was looking at the inside of a dark cave with some statuary on the right. Two lithe red-clad women leaped into the cave, one clad in black and red armor, the other in a bare-midriffed pink and red gymnast's costume.

The armor-clad woman struck a pose and pointed. "_Pull_ the lever, Ty Lee."

The gymnast pulled down one of the projections on the statuary—and a trap door opened under the armored woman, who dropped out of sight. "WRONG LEVERRRRRRRRRRR!"

Korra heard a distant splash.

A moment later, the armored woman, dripping wet, appeared through a large stone mouth-like door on the left with an alligator firmly clamped onto her ankle. She shot a burst of blue fire at the alligator, who whimpered and scurried away. "Why do we even _have_ that lever?" The gymnast smiled and shrugged.

Back in the forest, Jet tapped Aang on the chest. "Let's go through that again."

Aang shrugged, ropes and all. "Okay."

He turned to Zuko. "Okay, you got me, Zuko. Would you like to flame me now, or wait til you get home?"

"Flame him now, flame him now," Jet said in a sing-song voice.

"You keep out of this, he doesn't have to flame you now," Aang said in kind.

Jet pointed. "AHA!"

He turned to Zuko. "Pronoun trouble."

He came back to Aang, shaking his head. "It isn't, 'He doesn't have to flame _you_ now.' It's 'He doesn't have to flame _me_ now.' "

Jet got furious again. "_Well, I say he _does_ have to flame me now!_"

He turned to Zuko. "_**So flame me now!**_"

Zuko, still bewildered, shrugged again and hit Jet with another gout of flame, leaving Jet bug-eyed and even more charred.

"Good…" Korra's attention was now drawn to a dark flame-lit private room, where Fire Lord Ozai was reading some papers. Ozai was smiling. "Good… this fits in well with our current plans. By tomorrow night, everything will be in place."

"Why, Ozai?" Fire Lady Ursa tilted her head. "What are you doing _now?_ What are you doing tomorrow night?"

"The same thing we do every night, Ursa." Ozai smiled cruelly, and raised and shook a clenched fist. "_**Try to take over the world!**_"

Ursa made a face, stood there a moment longer, then turned. "I'm leaving."

Ozai was crestfallen. "What? Ursa!"

Somehow back in the forest, Korra looked on the whole thing, bewildered. "I don't understand all this."

"It'll be all right, Korra." She turned, and there stood the tall, broad-shouldered white-haired Earthbender Tyro, Haru's father. (Why Korra knew all this, she didn't know.) "All of this is part and parcel of being the Avatar. I am certain you will find an answer to your questions in time."

"Are you sure?" Korra said dubiously. "All this seems so _weird_."

"Completely." Tyro smiled. "Some of this is merely your mind working through what you have seen. The rest…" He waved his arm open-handed to the side. "Merely imagination. Over time, you'll learn what to hold on to and what to let go."

All of a sudden, there was Meng, cone-like ponytails all white and clad in white and ice blue. "Did someone say 'Let It Go'?"

All of another sudden, Aang, Zuko, Jet, Azula, and Ty Lee swooped up in chorus. "**NO.**"

"Awww…." Meng exited stage-right, trailing snowflakes.

"ENOUGH."

The sky darkened. Tyro, Zuko, Jet, Aang, Azula, and Ty Lee all twitched and shook, their faces contorting as they tried to break free of whatever held them. Another figure rose from a hole in the desert floor, wearing a brown jumpsuit and a white mask with a large red circle in the center of its forehead.

Korra knew all too well who this was. She shook a little herself. "Amon!" she whispered.

"It is clear, even in this distorted reality, what the evil of bending is capable of. This madness is an obvious by-product of it. It will be removed." Amon raised his hand. "You will all be cleansed."

Then Amon went bug-eyed as an anvil squished him into a hole in the desert floor.

Korra and the others looked up—to see Sokka on a conveniently placed rock overhang. He grinned. "Gee. Ain't I a stinker?"

o o o

Korra woke up late that morning with the sun on her face and an Earthbender pounding away on her head with rocks—no, that's just what it felt like. It was a monster headache that she woke up with.

Pema peeked in through the crack in the door, then seeing Korra was awake, poked her head in. "Good morning, Korra!" She came into the room. "I was beginning to wonder about you. Did you sleep well?"

"_No_," Korra groaned. She held her stomach, which also wasn't feeling too well. "Pema—I think you ought to buy another brand of noodles or _something_."

"Really? Why? Do you have a stomachache?" Pema tilted her head. "Did you have a bad dream?"

Korra looked at her, still bleary. She shook her head. "You don't wanna know."

o o o

Several multicolored concentric rings on a black background dropped down from above. Meng poked her head through the middle, her hair back to its normal dark brown, and waved. "That's all, folks!"


	2. The Fire Lord and the Waterbender

Now, this one I'm _really_ wondering what you're going to think of. :D This is definitely a change of pace for me; I've never written in this particular, um, style, I guess you could say. Please do tell me what you think.

And if you know my shipping preferences, all I can say is: trust me. On both sides. :D Hope you like it.

* * *

_**The Fire Lord and the Waterbender**_

She waited for him in one of the private rooms of the Palace.

It was as private as such a room could be, several doors away from the main hall, where the gathering was still taking place, where all the Four Nations had come to discuss, and dance, and partake of the Fire Nation's generosity. It was so easy to slip away amongst such a multitude.

_Too easy_, she wondered. _What if someone followed me? That would be easy enough too._

She took that with her to the room's balcony, and cast her ponderings among the stars: the fear. The worry. The fate of nations and peoples hung in the balance this night, and all because she could have been a little more careful…

Yet the stars accepted that. They absorbed her fear and sparkled with the brilliance of a thousand possibilities because she _had_ chosen to risk all.

To escape a loveless betrothal.

To find someone she truly loved.

She would pay that price, and declare unto a thousand generations hence that yes... she had dared to love.

With that she went back into the room.

Candles burned in their sconces, stout tan lightgivers, showing the dark woods of the furniture and burgundy tapestries and trappings that hung from the walls. The dark red of the Fire Nation.

The urgent lifeblood of passion.

The door opened—and she turned in fearful surprise.

Then _he_ entered.

Tall—thin—broad in the shoulders. The golden flame of the Fire Lord in his muddy hair and the flash of fire-burned flesh around his left eye. The wound long healed, but the eye still squinted through a prison of scarred flesh.

It grew kind on seeing her at last.

"You."

One word. A multitude of feelings.

He walked toward her.

She hesitated; if she dared now, if they were discovered now, her life was forfeit. Wars would break out. Generations yet unborn would curse her for the tumult she could have prevented.

Yet passion ruled over all.

She ran to him, and plunged into his embrace, the stiff burgundy and gold brocade of his robe a chafing sea. But it didn't matter. It was worth it.

After a moment of holding him, she squeezed and let go, slightly, only to look at him. And smile. "Yes. Me."

He returned the smile, warmly, on seeing his beloved so close, at long last, but… concern grew on his brow. He sombered. "You shouldn't have come."

If he had wanted to see her passion, oh, there it was now. Her eyes flashed, a glint of light in her blue eyes like lightning upon the sea, promising a storm to come with destruction in its wake. "Why? Or more to the point, why not? When will we ever have this chance again?"

"There are chances, my darling. There are other times."

"Chances." She looked away, angry. "Chances and chances, with the whole world between us. With the whole world against us!" She turned back to him. "And now, you and I are here. Now. We don't have to wait anymore. We don't have to excuse anymore. We have what we want. Now. Right now."

She saw the conflict in his eyes, the duty, the responsibilities of leading his people, and all that came with the hard, cold reality of being responsible for his entire nation. The terrible weight of rulership. Now threatened to be unbalanced by a single touch, and come crashing to earth in ruination.

She touched his chin and cheek. "They _will_ learn. They _will_ understand. They'll know that we did it—for love."

Did it for love. One of the keystones and touchstones of his reign.

And here, in his arms, the very one he wanted most in the entire world, despite treaty, despite wars, despite anything that could be explained by cold, hard words and not with soft, warm emotion… soft warm belonging.

Soft, warm, longing.

He leaned toward her. A bare finger's breadth separated their lips from being joined in a fiery embrace of their spirits. And then, he came just that much closer… and _jinorrrraaaaaaaa!_

o o o

Jinora blinked. That time she knew she heard something.

"Jinorrrraaaaaa! Time to gooooooo!"

She sighed. _Ikki. And just when it was getting good, too._ "All riiiiiight! I'm coooooming!"

Jinora found her bookmark, then marked her place in the book, closed it, and put it on the bed. She got up, hurried to the doorway—then thought better of it. She came back, tucked the book under her pillow, then scampered down the stairs and headed for the docks.

She thought about what she had been reading, and smiled. _I think I've got another question for Gran-Gran._

* * *

**A/N:** Don't worry-I won't quit my day job. XD


	3. Of Cabbages and Kings

I guess I shouldn't have expected any reviews off of that last one; it was a little borderline, shipping-wise, for someone like me. :D But there it is.

I apologize for the long delay between stories; I have to admit I was waiting for the spirit to move me sometimes to write, when in fact, it was up to me to move the spirit. So here we are. I hope to write more in the coming months. I do have a number of ideas; it's the matter of transferring them into coherent, electronic form that's the problem.

I don't think the main characters in this next one need much introduction. :D This is kind of a "what if", connect-the-dots sort of story. Hope you like it. Please do tell me what you think, regardless, and thank you again for reading.

* * *

_**Of Cabbages and Kings**_

It was quiet that day in the markets in Yu Dao—as quiet as could be expected, at least with the hustle and bustle of buyers and sellers, the clanking of metalware from the Fire Nation, vendors hawking their produce and goods, groans and grumbles in the direction of the fishmongers when the wind changed direction. Pretty quiet, really.

Or it was.

A young Water Tribesman tore through at top speed, a green and cream-clad Earth Kingdom woman at his heels. Behind them was a pack of brick red-clad guards.

"You shouldn't have said that, Sokka!"

"Well, how was I to know that was his sister?"

They ran through the street and away, the guards in hot pursuit. Their voices faded, still arguing. A shrug, a comment and chuckle from the vendors and customers, but that was about it. One produce vendor, though, let out a sigh of relief.

Then they barreled back through the street again. A mischievous kid tossed some lychees out into the street.

Which the Water Tribesman didn't see. He stepped on the lychees, slipped—"Yaaaaa!" –and came down hard. "Uhhh!"

"Sokka!" The woman came up to him, stopped, and threw up her arms. Dust flew up from the ground, engulfing everything.

"Where are they?!"

"We'll find you, you little ratsnakes!"

"Toph—"

"Shh! Be quiet!"

"There!" A guard punched a firebolt.

"Hey!" "Stop!" "You're gonna hit _us!_"

The street went silent as the guards listened for their quarry—and the buyers and sellers shut up for fear of getting hit. A moment later, though, a breeze came in from the sea, and away went the dust.

And the cover. The man and woman were at the end of the street. Almost safe.

"There!" Again the guard punched fire. Everyone downrange ducked.

"Is that all you have to say?" The Earth woman smirked and mocked him. "_There! There, there!_"

That drew another firebolt—which she blocked with a strong step and a slab of rock. The guard kept firing, she kept blocking, and the other guards advanced slowly trying to flank the woman, until she smirked again and twisted the top of the rock. That deflected the latest fireblast into what _had_ been a herd of tame ostrich horses.

"_Squaaaaaaaawk!_"

The ostrich horses exploded out of their stalls, bowled over the guards, and thundered into the rest of the market, toward one of the vendor's stalls.

"_No no no no no no—_"

BOOM.

And through.

The Water Tribesman and Earth Kingdom woman fled.

"After them!" The guards picked themselves up and ran after, leaving behind a lot of dust, a few smoldering stalls, some chattering customers, and well.

"_**My cabbages!**_"

"Your cabbages?!" The ostrich horse herder was indignant. "My ostrich horses!"

That earned the herder a glare. "_You_ still have something to sell! Whereas I…" He looked back and moaned. "My cabbages…"

Across the street, a pair of vendors were laughing. One turned to the other. "And… it's just before lunch. Pay up." The other one grumbled and started digging in his pockets.

The ostrich horse herder ran after his herd, and people turned back to what they'd been doing before the excitement started. The cabbage merchant turned back to the ruins of his stall, signed, and started to salvage what he could. Again.

"Let me help you with that."

The cabbage merchant raised his head. That was new.

He turned. The voice came from a kindly-faced man, clad in rags, but there was some strange decorum about him. He was clean, for one, and he wore a pair of small pince-nez glasses.

The man started picking up some broken boards. "I'm surprised those men were laughing. What happened wasn't funny."

The merchant started doing the same with the cabbages, sorting out the salvageable ones. "Oh, I guess it's funny to them! This happens all the time!"

"What?"

"Oh, yes! No sooner do I get all set up, then something happens, and boom!" He threw his arms wide. "My cart, my stall, my cabbages—" He turned mournful again. "My cabbages."

The man looked off to where the Water Tribesman and Earth Kingdom woman had run. "I think I recognized those two who ran off. I'm very surprised." He paused. "Although come to think of it, I also don't know what they did to be chased like that."

"Does it matter?" The cabbage merchant waved his arms. "All I know is once I see them, my cabbages are history! When I went to Omashu—"

"You were in Omashu?"

"Yes! I had my cart on the great bridge into the city. The guard saw something he didn't like, and he blew my cabbages clean off the bridge. And those kids were right behind me!"

The man's brow furrowed. "But if they were behind you—"

"And then I tried in the Fire Nation with another cart—"

"Another cart?"

"Yes! Another cart of cabbages! And that time was just like this time. They were running away from something, and I got in _their way_, and there went my cabbages! Again!"

The man frowned. "So they _were_ involved."

"I'll say they were involved!"

The ostrich horse herder came back, dusty, but with four ostrich horses on lead reins behind him. "Got 'em all back!" There was a cheer. He stuck his tongue out at the cabbage merchant.

The man frowned. "How rude!"

The cabbage merchant ignored the herder. "So after that, I thought I'd go to Ba Sing Se!"

"Ba Sing Se?" The man was surprised. "That's on the other side of the world!"

"That's what _I_ thought! Surely that would be far enough away! But no sooner did I get to the front of the line for the ferry ticket than they deny me a ticket, destroy my cart _and_ my cabbages, and haul me away for trying to import diseased goods!"

The man looked uncertain. "Diseased… goods?"

"My cabbages were fine, I tell you! Fine as could be! _I know_ cabbages!"

The man hid a smile. "I'm starting to discover."

"But they accused me of threatening the ecosystem of Ba Sing Se! With my cabbages! So they destroyed them _and_ my cart _again!_ And those kids were there!"

The man tilted his head. "But if it was the security at the ferry that—"

"And that's not all." Fury and grief were in the cabbage merchant's face. "I finally _did_ get into Ba Sing Se, I got another cart and another load of cabbages, and what happens? One of those kid opened up an entire _zoo_ worth of animals, and _that_ cart of cabbages got devoured by a rabberoo!"

"And so here you are now in Yu Dao…"

"Exactly! And this happens! Again! All because of those meddling kids!"

The man didn't say anything else for a while. He knelt, and kept picking up and sorting the pieces of the stall. The cabbage merchant looked like he had more to say—a lot more—but without the man's helpful prompts, he seemed… at a loss. He joined the man on the ground and got back to work on the cabbages.

"I think that's pretty impressive."

The cabbage merchant screwed up his face. "Excuse me?"

"So you were in Omashu, with a load of cabbages…"

"Almost!" The merchant brandished a cabbage. "Almost!"

"All right. Almost." The man smiled. "Then somehow you found both another load of cabbages _and_ another cart to haul them—and in the Fire Nation, no less."

"Yes, I did!"

"And then, not only did you find _and_ get another load of cabbages _and_ another cart, you did that on the other side of the world, and you were ready to take them to Ba Sing Se—which as you saw wasn't easy."

"Yes…" The cabbage merchant was suspicious, and yet he was enjoying hearing about himself.

"And then you _did_ get into Ba Sing Se _and_ found more cabbages _and_ yet another cart!"

"_Which that kid and that rabberoo_—well, okay."

"And _now_, here you are _back_ in the Fire Nation, on the other side of the world again, with yet _more_ cabbages! And this time, you don't have a cart—you have a _stall_."

The cabbages merchant was sheepishly pleased. "Well, I… love cabbages."

"I can see that!" the man laughed. "But don't you see what I'm saying?"

"No."

"You were in one, two three, four, _five_ different places—that you told me about—all over the world, and you found a way to gather together the things you love and make a business of it. Five separate times! That's a talent!"

"Not without sacrifice!" Again the cabbage got brandished. "Not without sacrifice!"

"But that's what I'm saying!" The man threw his arms wide. "If you could do that with cabbages, you could do this with… anything."

"No!"

"No?" The man tilted his head. "No what?"

"_You_ are about to suggest that I give up my cabbages in exchange for… whatever this flim-flam thing is that you're going to suggest!"

"No, I'm not."

"Yes you are!"

"_No_, I'm not."

"Yes you are!"

"The only thing I'm suggesting," the man said, slightly indignant, "is that you have a very worthy talent, and how you use it… is up to you. In fact, I'm going to try and remember you when I finally go home."

The cabbage merchant waved him away. "Whatever you say."

They sat there a moment, then the man smiled and returned to picking things up. "I really didn't mean to offend."

The cabbage merchant continued to sit there, looking at the man quizzically. "Why did you say that?"

The man looked up, the smile still on his face. "That I didn't mean to offend?"

"No! About me!"

"About you having a talent?"

"Yes! And remembering me when you go home! That's just weird!"

"Hm. Another head tilt. "Now that you mention it, it does sound odd."

"Yes! It does!"

The man put down the wood he'd been gathering. "Well, to answer your first question, I was just making an observation. You seemed pretty low, and I wanted to share what I thought of what you told me. And to answer your second question—well, I'd better not answer that one yet. But I only meant good things by it."

"Hmph!" The cabbage merchant crossed his arms. "I'm sure."

Again they sat there for a moment.

The man stood. "Well, I think I've done everything I can for you." He looked at the stall and its pieces. "Unless you wanted me to help with the cabbages, which I'm guessing—"

"No."

"I thought so." The man paused, then picked up a piece of wood. He turned it over and looked at the other side, nodded, then put it back. He turned to the cabbage merchant. "But I would like something else."

"Yeah? What?"

"Two cabbages, please."

"_What?_"

"Two cabbages, please." Another smile. "You are still selling them, aren't you?"

"Er, yes. All right. Eight fen."

The man nodded and dug out the coins. "I think Bosco should like these."

"Bosco? Who's that?"

"He's my bear."

"Your… bear?"

"Yes, my bear."

"Not your platypus bear?"

"No."

"Not your skunk bear?"

The man shook his head. "Certainly not."

"Your… bear."

"Yes."

The cabbage merchant stood there. Then he snorted. Then chortled. Then broke into a full-on belly laugh.

The man stood there too. "My cabbages, please?"

It was another moment before the cabbage merchant could compose himself enough to hand over the cabbages, laughing all throughout. The man, though, apparently used to this, simply raised his cap. "Have a nice day." He left.

And left the cabbage merchant still full-on laughing. "And people say _I'm_ weird! Your _bear!_" He kept on laughing.

o o o

A year or so later, the cabbage merchant wasn't laughing when he received a royal summons from Ba Sing Se. Nor was the royal messenger laughing when he delivered it. That made an impression on the cabbage merchant. He followed the messenger.

To the astonishment of the Royal Court, and most certainly the cabbage merchant himself, the Earth King told his tale of exile when Ba Sing Se fell, and how he and his bear had traveled the length and breadth of the kingdom, mostly to escape but partly to experience. He had indeed been impressed by the cabbage merchant's skills, and now he wanted to offer the cabbage merchant a job, as an administrator in his kingdom. To the court's astonishment (again), the cabbage merchant refused.

Prepared, the Earth King had a second offer: a royal warrant as vendor of produce for the Royal Court (including, of course, all authority over royal cabbage procurement). The cabbage merchant accepted.

He did cringe those first few times that "those meddling kids" came to the Earth King's Court, but in time he realized that "his" cabbages were far away from any harm. He became happier (and wealthier) beyond his wildest dreams, he and his family after him.

Unfortunately, of course, we know how that turned out.

"**_No!_** Not my Cabbage Corp!"


End file.
